Search

Member Login

News Sections

Partnerships

MAJOR EVENTS SUMMIT 2018

A message for those who couldn't attend the summit.

I know you were unable to attend the Summit this year and for some people July turned out to be a very busy period. As you know, we set the date for 2017 as late as possible to create the maximum possible gap from last Summit in October and the clock will now be re-calibrated to allow a June date from now on; more below. I hope this short note gives you a feel for what happened a few weeks ago at the 2017 Summit and we would welcome a more personal debrief should you wish to get in touch.

The programme and attendees and some pictures are enclosed and comments are as follows:

Attendees: We were very grateful to have the support of Tokyo 2020 Procurement and Marketing directors who spent the two days with us plus other Japanese agencies. This provided some great relationship building opportunities. Pan American Games Lima were covered and the one to one sessions also proved to be very popular. We will continue to get more Federations and Clubs to come and look at less high profile competitions where there is opportunity for you. The right mix across sectors and between suppliers and buyers was achieved.

Programme: The highly interactive and inclusive nature of Member involvement in the programme is now well established. Workshops were allocated more time this year to allow more time for discussion and the cross sector report back proved to be very popular again. With a major focus on Japan, and some time spent on Pan American Games Lima, this significantly tightened the time available for panels but the balance seemed about right. Twodays plus a VIP pre-summit programme (more below) is needed to get the right mix of content and what also seemed to work is a country focus at the end of day 2 for those interested in the market in focus (Japan this year).

Capability Stands and Sponsors: Again this concept worked well of having capability stands amongst all networking areas. There was a pre-Summit event where VIPs , sponsors and international delegates were invited to attend and they viewed the Olympic Park in legacy mode, toured the main stadium and attended a drinks reception. This separate event will continue in 2018.

One to One meetings: Tokyo 2020 and Lima 2019 were very positive about meetings they had with attendees. We will look at a mix of small group workshops where capabilities which may be procured later in the procurement cycle would better work for attendees meeting key clients.

Awards Dinner: The BT Sport TV Studio setting for the dinner provided a spectacular backdrop and award winners had a bottle of Wimbledon champagne to balance off the Touch of Ginger Baton this year. With plenty of video and photography support, this is now a well established part of the Summit.

Major Events Handbook: Hard copies of the handbook were available for the Summit and this has proven to be a very popular initiative; so much so we will be contacting you soon to start building the 2018 version. You are entitled to your own hard copy and you will also get an e-version soon and this can be distributed as widely as you see fit. Articles will feature in the MEI Digest given we have a year to re-use great content.

Plans for the 2018 Summit: We have been invited to hold the Summit as part of the International Festival of Business in Liverpool 27 and 28 June. We will hold a pre-summit Sponsor and VIP event again the night before and we are working on the programme now. The Summit will grow to 200 people as this is a contractual obligation but we will take great care to ensure it does not lose the intimate approach which is key to success.

Initiatives stemming From 2017 Summit :

It has been decided that a half year approach to get people together, across all sectors, would be beneficial. We are therefore planning a smaller event, focused at contact with Federations, in Lausanne during 11 and 12 January 2018, hosted by World Archery. This is work in progress but more details will follow soon.

We have also refreshed the Events Calendar with a view to getting more frequent opportunities to meet and to allow you to host events too.

Growing the network is important and we encourage you to find new members so we continue to gain the profile and access you need and we can talk about incentives for this with you.

We welcome your feedback and or questions. The Summit is now at a different level than the first edition so we are now full throttle to make sure it really is recognised as a global leadership forum albeit it seems it has already achieved in reality.